For decades on end he had been building his house on shaky ground. Over and over again it had collapsed, but not suspecting that the ground was shaky, he kept building on it.

During a trip to the city, guided by That Which Cannot Be Named, he had entered a bookstore and purchased a book of ancient teachings. Through hard and repeated effort he practiced those teachings, unsure if his labors would bear fruit but trying to cultivate a stillness within.

He built his house on more solid ground, but it soon slid back onto the shaky stuff, and collapsed. After pondering the situation he realized that he needed to check the structural blueprint he was using to build. Sure enough, he discovered a weakness contained deep within it, a tenacious shadow nestled into its core. The building was his life; the house his sense of meaning, self, purpose, worth; the shadow a nagging heartbreak as old as time itself.